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For those of you searching for family on Madeira, there is a website, http://www.arquivo-madeira.org/homepage.php?lang=1 , that allows you to search Passport, Baptism and Marriage Records.
When you go to this site, clic on databases on the left, you will get a list of the databases available on-line. At the end of the description is a search link. The passport records show the names of the parents. If married it will show the names of parents for husband and wife. Also, there may have been one or more companions that went along that would be listed as well. The information if free, but you can purchase the actual documents, which do not cost much, about $5.00
This is very cool as I found my great grandparents and great2 grandparents there as well.
Be advised when looking that about the last names of people. My last name for example is Freitas and my great grandfathers name was Antonio Freitas. When looking up the marriage records I found that my great grandfathers name was shown as Antonio da Silva and that his fathers name was Antonio de Freitas Silva.
The reason for this is that Name changes were very common in Madeira as well as Portugal and the Azores. People were given a Christian name (First Name) in Baptism. When they grew up, they were to choose a FAMILY name as their first official act, (very often at their marriage or when they boutht/sold some property. etc.). They could pick any surname from any of their family names. If they were mad at their father or brothers, they might pick a different surname from theirs.
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